Monday, February 03, 2014

Chagall: Two Left Hands?

As an undergrad at Baylor University back in the latter 70s, I didn't know much about art, but I somehow acquired a poster of Chagall's Pinch of Snuff (also known as The Rabbi), though I didn't know the title back then. I called it "Rabbi with a Book." I liked it a lot and so taped it to the wall of my room, where I stared at it for hours, all told. There was some uncanny quality it possessed, and I took a long time in realizing what that "it" was. Eventually, however, I was drawn to focus on the rabbi's right hand, which seemed awkward, twisted in some way, until I saw that this right hand was another left hand.

Why?

I know from German that "zwei linke Hände haben" (to have two left hands) means "to be all thumbs," that is, "to be clumsy," but I don't know if this idiom is relevant here.

Incidentally, Chagall seems to have made at least two variants of this painting, for I've seen one of them with my own eyes at the Kunstmuseum in Basel, dated 1923-26, whereas the one above, dated to 1912, is displayed in The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. My poster's version was more like the variant in Basel. The Hebrew letters on the Torah scroll curtain differ, incidentally, the older painting displaying the abbreviation for God's name and the more recent painting displaying letters standing for "Torah Scroll," according to Benjamin Harshav in The Polyphony of Jewish Culture (2007).

Anyway, all the versions I've found online share this same uncanniness because of the two left hands. Does any reader know why Chagall did this?

14 Comments:

Well, Chagall also turned heads upside down, etc. But in this case, the Rabbi's right hand really looks like a right hand to me: he is smoking the way some people do, holding the cigarette between the thumb and the index, and the palm toward 'us.'

The hand is simplified according to Chagall's style, but I don't see it as a 'wrong' -- or symbolic -- detail. The palm is clearly recognizable by the fleshy, bulging part at the 'root' of the thumb. (Hope it is clear, I lack too many words to describe it properly.)

I think Dario is correct that the hand is a right hand (mainly because of the "meat" of the thumb which defines the hand), but I can see the optical illusion as well, and I can definitely see JK's "six fingers" just by staring exclusively at the fingertips all in a row: there really seem to be five fingertips, plus that thumb. It's almost Escherian, this effect.

"Right," the nails do suggest a double image. This also is a feature of Chagall's paintings. I used to hold a column on Chagall's illustrations for the Bible in this Italian blogand such 'dreamy' features proved to convey very deep and witty meanings, but I honestly wouldn't know how to interpret the Rabbi's portrait here.

I see this as a normal motion for putting snuff in your lip. As a former smokeless tobacco user, the hand is actually turned with the palm facing the chin so that is why you can see the fingernails. You can try the motion yourself and see what I am talking about. It would be almost impossible to put snuff in your lip with your palm facing outward.

I do agree te hand "looks" awkward, but it is actually correct for the act being performed.

But Jay, if it "would be almost impossible to put snuff in your lip with your palm facing outward," then this hand would be another left hand -- assuming that the snuff goes into the lip, but isn't snuff meant for the nose?

Sorry, had to stop the last comment before I was done. Per the previous comment, I agree with Jeff that the painting is depicting two left hands.

I do not see any discernable lines that you would expect to see if the palm was facing outwards. Also, the Rabbi is not smoking but putting snuff in his mouth. Of course that is the point of most art, to cause conversations and varying opinions.

I suppose the snuff could be for his nose, but there again, if the palm is facing out you would not see fingernails as you observed, and if the palm is not facing out the fingers are on the wrong side. Two left hands for me.

About Me

I am a professor at Ewha Womans University, where I teach composition, research writing, and cultural issues, including the occasional graduate seminar on Gnosticism and Johannine theology and the occasional undergraduate course on European history.
My doctorate is in history (U.C. Berkeley), with emphasis on religion and science. My thesis is on John's gospel and Gnosticism.
I also work as one-half of a translating team with my wife, and our most significant translation is Yi Kwang-su's novel The Soil, which was funded by the Literature Translation Institute of Korea.
I'm also an award-winning writer, and I recommend my novella, The Bottomless Bottle of Beer, to anyone interested.
I'm originally from the Arkansas Ozarks, but my academic career -- funded through doctoral and postdoctoral fellowships (e.g., Fulbright, Naumann, Lady Davis) -- has taken me through Texas, California, Switzerland, Germany, Australia, and Israel and has landed me in Seoul, South Korea. I've also traveled to Mexico, visited much of Europe, including Moscow, and touched down briefly in a few East Asian countries.
Hence: "Gypsy Scholar."